Doctors who use the popular search engine Google to help diagnose tricky cases may find a correct diagnosis about 60 per cent of the time, Australian researchers have found.
"Our study suggests that in difficult diagnostic cases, it is often useful to 'google for a diagnosis,' " Hangwi Tang, a respiratory and sleep physician at Princess Alexandra Hospital in Brisbane and his colleague concluded in Friday's online issue of the British Medical Journal.
Google seems to work as a diagnostic aid for doctors about 60 per cent of the time.
"Web-based search engines such as Google are becoming the latest tools in clinical medicine, and doctors in training need to become proficient in their use."
The researchers chose three to five search terms for difficult-to-diagnose illnesses and then compared how well Google did compared with reports published in 2005 in the New England Journal of Medicine.
In comparing the top hits for symptoms and the correct diagnosis, Google was correct in 15 of the 26 cases, or 58 per cent of the time.
The conditions included Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, the hormonal condition Cushing's syndrome and the auto-immune disorder Churg-Strauss syndrome.
Patients less likely to search successfully
Searches were less likely to be successful in complex diseases with non-specific symptoms such as lymphoma, or common diseases with rare presentations, such as endometriosis, the researchers said.
"Patients doing a Google search may find the search less efficient and be less likely to reach the correct diagnosis," Tang and the study's co-author, Jennifer Hwee Kwoon Ng, a rheumatologist, wrote. "We believe that Google searches by a 'human expert' (a doctor) have a better yield."
Doctors in training may find Google searches educational and useful in forming a differential diagnosis, one of the most challenging and fulfilling roles of a physician, the researchers said.
Google Scholar, currently in beta form, is likely to be even more useful since it searches only peer reviewed articles, the pair noted.
In performing the study, the researchers chose combinations of search terms they felt would be unique, including "statistically improbable phrases" such as "cardiac arrest sleep."
The Google searches were done blinded, that is, before the researchers read the correct diagnosis from the published cases.
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